GIDEON: MIGHTY MAN OF VALOR

#043                                                    GIDEON: MIGHTY MAN OF VALOR                                                                           

Scripture  Judges 6:11-18, 22-23 NIV                                                                                           Orig. 11/4/62 (11/77)

                                                                                                                                                                                  Rewr. 10/4/85 

Passage:  ¹¹ The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. ¹² When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.”  ¹³ “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”  ¹⁴ The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”  ¹⁵ “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.”

¹⁶ The Lord answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.”

¹⁷ Gideon replied, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, give me a sign that it is really you talking to me. ¹⁸ Please do not go away until I come back and bring my offering and set it before you.”  And the Lord said, “I will wait until you return.”

 ²² When Gideon realized that it was the angel of the Lord, he exclaimed, “Alas, Sovereign Lord! I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face!”

²³ But the Lord said to him, “Peace! Do not be afraid. You are not going to die.”

Purpose: To lead my people in an in-depth study of Gideon and his spiritual resolution, and what we may learn thereby.

Keywords:          Character            God                       Power                   Missions

Timeline/Series:               Old Testament Characters

Introduction

                Gideon is called here a “mighty man of valor.”  It is a term that can be misapplied. We usually go through a relatively simple process when we make such judgments about other people.  Compared to another, how does that particular person measure up?  Is Gideon such a “man of valor,” or is it that compared to those around him, he left such an impression?

                Tennyson had to resort to fiction to find one who accommodated his own characteristics of human supremacy. He wrote of Sir Galahad

“My good blade carves the casques of men.

My tough lance thrusteth sure:

My strength is as the strength of ten,

Because my heart is pure.”

                It is far easier to find those whose “hearts” are not pure, who are not “men of valor.”  During New Orleans days, a young seminary friend stopped by my office.  He was serving a church in the Bogalusa area, and was in the pastor’s office there.  A church member came in with an armload of mops.  He began to berate the pastor for allowing such a budget travesty.  “Why had they bought so many mops that could only be used one at a time?”  After the man had his say and left, someone in the room commended the pastor for keeping his cool under such an unnecessary outburst.  My friend said that the pastor’s reply was a classic.  “It really isn’t that hard to understand his feeling, when one is aware that the total sum of his contributions for the year is tied up in unused mops.”

                Compared to Tennyson’s Galahad, few of us would be considered as “people of valor,” but compared to the “Bogalusa Badman” most of us could smile and be happy about what we are.

                Gideon is clearly a “man of valor.”  His are characteristics which God often chooses to bless.

I.             It is to a Prepared Man that God Comes.  There can be little doubt that Gideon spent long lonely hours at his vigil.  He has poured out his soul beseeching God for an answer to Israel’s dilemma.  Note his reply to the angel (v13) “O my Lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all of this happened  to us?”

                How often people are prepared for spiritual challenge by their distresses.  Isaiah—“In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord.”  Hosea—Understood and revealed Israel’s infidelity by experiencing it in his own family.  Martin Luther—Climbed the 52 steps of the “Scala Sancta” on his knees and spoke out against the church, fellow priests, and scholars; as a separated clergyman, in his arms little Magdalena lay dying—it nearly destroyed him, until he received God’s peace.

                For others, it is the challenge alone that prepares them for their work.  Too many of us think in terms of why we can’t accomplish something.  There are some who consider only what they must.  Gideon knew why this would be a most difficult undertaking.  The Midianites were determined and ruthless.  Israel was in a state of confusion.  Even Gideon’s own house was torn down for idolatry. V25 tells of the statue of Baal in Gideon’s father’s house.

                200 years ago, William Carey, the father of modern  missions, had not yet gone to the mission field, had not yet begun to pastor, had not yet been baptized.  We must remember that mission is a recent concept.  His major challenge was to overcome not the hardships of the mission field, but the excuses of the people on the home front. It was too great a distance (but not for commerce); the people were uncivilized (but Paul went to Gaul and the Britons); the discomforts—but that’s for the missionary to decide; the language barrier—that didn’t stop the East India Company.

                Yet others were prepared by vision. Against Gideon’s excuses the Lord responded 6:14, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”

II.            It is to One with Purpose that God Comes.  It is not with only the sense of a purpose that God comes, as if the man alone is what God needs. It is the purpose, linking the man’s life with some noble cause.

                God offers His strength to implement that of Gideon.  V15 “So he said to Him, ‘O my Lord, how can I save Israel?  My clan is the weakest, and I am the least in my father’s house.’ And the Lord said to him, ‘Surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man.’”  We see a nation come to grief.  A family is described (Gideon was the son of Joash the Abiezrite whose own father was a Baal worshiper):  Gideon is a man who views himself as an unlikely candidate for honor.

                God’s strength is offered for God’s purpose.  God has already given unconditional promises.  Genesis 9:13 “I set my bow in the clouds as a sign of covenant between me and the earth.”  Judges 2:1 “I will never break my covenant with you.”  God never wills to leave us in distress except to our good.  Gideon is that chosen vessel for good.

                Gideon is a proof text for people caught in the mire of Spiritual lethargy.  Perhaps we see characteristics that are reminiscent of Gideon in us.  What would be our reaction to an angel? “You’ve come to the wrong house.  Let me get a roadmap and help you on your way.”  But God chooses to use us in His cause.  There are injustices. You do feel unworthy. “Accept my purpose and I will use you.”

                Gideon would succeed where others had failed because God’s purpose would become his purpose.

III.           Finally, it is to Anoint with Power that God Comes.  Gideon reaches out for some tangible evidence that he has not dreamed this.  He prepares an offering (v19).  A rock becomes an altar of proof (v21).  The first test came quickly.  God said “cut down the grove belonging to your father.” Gideon selected men of his own servants as others were not to be trusted.  When Gideon’s life was endangered, his father said “If my son has offended Baal, let Baal act.”

                Still, Gideon needed assurance.  Gideon challenges God to show by a particular sign that it is His work he is doing.  If the fleece is wet with dew and the ground around it is dry, “I will know your intent.” V37.

                When the day of battle comes, Gideon is instructed to disarm and go into battle with 300 who drink water funny. (Chapter 7)

                How like us this is.  Of all the ages we think ourselves the least likely candidate; of our father’s houses, I find me the least able.  We unite our voices in asking God, “Why?”  Do we hear Him say, “Go in this thy might”?

As a physicist said, “If there is no law in physics between me and my goal, I can get there.”

Conclusion

                Herbert Lockyer wrote that, without doubt, Gideon is among the brightest luminaries of Old Testament history.  His character and call are presented in a series of tableaux.  We see:

1-Gideon at the flail—the young man was threshing wheat when the call came to him to become the deliverer of his nation.  History teaches that obscurity of birth is no obstacle to noble service.  It was no dishonor for Gideon to say “My family is poor.”

2-Gideon at the altar—Gideon was God-fearing. His own father had become an idolater but Gideon vowed to remove the idols. No wonder they called him Jerubbaal, meaning “discomforter of Baal.”

3- Gideon and the fleece—Facing the great mission of his life, he had to have an assuring token that God was with him. God condescended to grant Gideon the double sign.

4-Gideon at the well—How fascinating is the incident of the reduction of Gideon’s army from 32,000 to 10,000, then to only 300.  The few, choice, brave, active men and God were in the majority against the swarms of Midian.  God is not always on the right side of big battalions.

5-Gideon with the whip—The men of Succoth and Penuel made themselves obnoxious, but with a whip of thorns Gideon meted out to them the punishment they deserved.

6-Gideon in the gallery of worthies--It was no small honor to have a place, as Gideon has, in the illustrious roll named in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, where every name is an inspiration, and every character a miracle of grace.

THE LORD'S INTERVENTION

#040 (continued from #035)             THE LORD’S INTERVENTION                                                                                  

Scripture Joel 2:18-3:21, NIV                                                                                                               Orig. Date 11-14-71

                                                                                                                                                                                  Rewr. 4-26-89 

Passage:
¹⁸ Then the Lord was jealous for his land
    and took pity on his people.

¹⁹ The Lord replied^[a] to them:

“I am sending you grain, new wine and olive oil,
    enough to satisfy you fully;
never again will I make you
    an object of scorn to the nations.

²⁰ “I will drive the northern horde far from you,
    pushing it into a parched and barren land;
its eastern ranks will drown in the Dead Sea
    and its western ranks in the Mediterranean Sea.
And its stench will go up;
    its smell will rise.”

Surely he has done great things!
²¹     Do not be afraid, land of Judah;
    be glad and rejoice.
Surely the Lord has done great things!
²²     Do not be afraid, you wild animals,
    for the pastures in the wilderness are becoming green.
The trees are bearing their fruit;
    the fig tree and the vine yield their riches.
²³ Be glad, people of Zion,
    rejoice in the Lord your God,
for he has given you the autumn rains
    because he is faithful.
He sends you abundant showers,
    both autumn and spring rains, as before.
²⁴ The threshing floors will be filled with grain;
    the vats will overflow with new wine and oil.

²⁵ “I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten—
    the great locust and the young locust,
    the other locusts and the locust swarm^[b]—
my great army that I sent among you.
²⁶ You will have plenty to eat, until you are full,
    and you will praise the name of the Lord your God,
    who has worked wonders for you;
never again will my people be shamed.
²⁷ Then you will know that I am in Israel,
    that I am the Lord your God,
    and that there is no other;
never again will my people be shamed.

²⁸ “And afterward,
    I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
    your old men will dream dreams,
    your young men will see visions.
²⁹ Even on my servants, both men and women,
    I will pour out my Spirit in those days.
³⁰ I will show wonders in the heavens
    and on the earth,
    blood and fire and billows of smoke.
³¹ The sun will be turned to darkness
    and the moon to blood
    before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
³² And everyone who calls
    on the name of the Lord will be saved;
for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem
    there will be deliverance,
    as the Lord has said,
even among the survivors
    whom the Lord calls.^[c]

3 ^[d]“In those days and at that time,
    when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem,
² I will gather all nations
    and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat.^[e]
There I will put them on trial
    for what they did to my inheritance, my people Israel,
because they scattered my people among the nations
    and divided up my land.
³ They cast lots for my people
    and traded boys for prostitutes;
    they sold girls for wine to drink.

⁴ “Now what have you against me, Tyre and Sidon and all you regions of Philistia? Are you repaying me for something I have done? If you are paying me back, I will swiftly and speedily return on your own heads what you have done. ⁵ For you took my silver and my gold and carried off my finest treasures to your temples.^[f] 6 You sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks, that you might send them far from their homeland.

⁷ “See, I am going to rouse them out of the places to which you sold them, and I will return on your own heads what you have done. ⁸ I will sell your sons and daughters to the people of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans, a nation far away.” The Lord has spoken.

⁹ Proclaim this among the nations:
    Prepare for war!
Rouse the warriors!
    Let all the fighting men draw near and attack.
¹⁰ Beat your plowshares into swords
    and your pruning hooks into spears.
Let the weakling say,
    “I am strong!”
¹¹ Come quickly, all you nations from every side,
    and assemble there.

Bring down your warriors, Lord!

¹² “Let the nations be roused;
    let them advance into the Valley of Jehoshaphat,
for there I will sit
    to judge all the nations on every side.
¹³ Swing the sickle,
    for the harvest is ripe.
Come, trample the grapes,
    for the winepress is full
    and the vats overflow—
so great is their wickedness!”

¹⁴ Multitudes, multitudes
    in the valley of decision!
For the day of the Lord is near
    in the valley of decision.
¹⁵ The sun and moon will be darkened,
    and the stars no longer shine.
¹⁶ The Lord will roar from Zion
    and thunder from Jerusalem;
    the earth and the heavens will tremble.
But the Lord will be a refuge for his people,
    a stronghold for the people of Israel.

¹⁷ “Then you will know that I, the Lord your God,
    dwell in Zion, my holy hill.
Jerusalem will be holy;
    never again will foreigners invade her.

¹⁸ “In that day the mountains will drip new wine,
    and the hills will flow with milk;
    all the ravines of Judah will run with water.
A fountain will flow out of the Lord’s house
    and will water the valley of acacias.^[g]
19 But Egypt will be desolate,
    Edom a desert waste,
because of violence done to the people of Judah,
    in whose land they shed innocent blood.
²⁰ Judah will be inhabited forever
    and Jerusalem through all generations.
²¹ Shall I leave their innocent blood unavenged?
    No, I will not.”

The Lord dwells in Zion!

Purpose: Continuing a study in the Prophet Joel, here describing God’s response to His people’s repentance.

Keywords            Bible Study         God, Sovereignty             Repentance

Series/Timeline                Minor Prophets                Sequential

Introduction

                The concluding part of chapter 2 gives much of the weight of choice to those who believe the book to be apocryphal.  He speaks of “wonders in heaven,” of “blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke” in the earth.  The sun is pictured becoming dark, the moon, bloodlike.   It is the terminology of the doomsayers.  But Joel is a simple prophet who loves God, and who loves his people, and his wish is to call these people “back” to God.

I.             He Holds Out to Them the Prospect of Intervention.  V18f “Then will the Lord be jealous for his land, and pity His people.” V21 “Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice; For the Lord will do great things.”

                What will be seen first are material blessings (vs 18-27): An abundance of crops, v19; deliverance from military peril, v20a; restoral of what they lost, v25—the stripped catalpa tree would be restored, the frost-bitten potatoes rejuvenated.

                The second consideration is of spiritual blessings (Joel 2:28-32),  when God’s Spirit comes to bring grace to His people (V28): on sons and daughters, on old and young, on bond and free.  In a day of utter darkness, there will be light, v31.  In a day of wasting, there will be a remnant to carry on, v32.

II.            A Final Word Describes a Judgment of World Proportions.  Joel 3:2 “I will gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people, . . . whom they have scattered among the nations.”  It is a temporal judgment because of the mistreatment of God’s people: “They have scattered my people;” “they have parted my land;” “they have abused the guiltless.”

                The judgment will be thorough.  There is accusation, v3, “They have cast lots for my people.”  There is investigation: They have taken treasures, v5—not of God’s house, but of God’s; they have abused God’s people, v6. As they have done, so will it be done to them. 

                There is condemnation, v9, “Prepare war, wake up the mighty men”; they are to make plowshares into swords.  Isaiah 2:4 and Micah 4:3 use the imagery, but it is reversed, and it is to God’s own people.

                Joel paints a vivid picture of the final confrontation of the forces of flesh and the power of God.  V11 “Assemble yourselves and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together, round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord.”  The heathen will appear in the valley  of decision (Jehoshaphat).  A day of terror is described.

III.           The Concluding Thought Is of Blessing Upon Believers.  V16b “The Lord will be the hope of His people, and the strength of the children of Israel.”  God will be their hope.  V16b “The Lord will be the hope of His people.”  God is their dwelling. V17 “I am the Lord  your God, dwelling in Zion.”  God  is their sufficiency. V18 “And a fountain shall come forth of the house of the Lord.”  God is their protector. V1--Egypt and Edom are described as desolate. Is the mention of Judah post-exilic? V20-21 “But Judah shall dwell forever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.  For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the Lord dwelleth in Zion.”

WHO CAN ABIDE THE DAY OF THE LORD?

#035                                             WHO CAN ABIDE THE DAY OF THE LORD?                                                                    

Scripture  Joel 1:1-2, 11                                                                                                                         Orig. Date  1/20/65

                                                                                                                                                                    Rewr. Dates  4/26/89 

Passage:  The word of the Lord that came to Joel son of Pethuel.² Hear this, you elders;
    listen, all who live in the land.
Has anything like this ever happened in your days
    or in the days of your ancestors?
³ Tell it to your children,
    and let your children tell it to their children,
    and their children to the next generation.
⁴ What the locust swarm has left
    the great locusts have eaten;
what the great locusts have left
    the young locusts have eaten;
what the young locusts have left
    other locusts^[a] have eaten.

⁵ Wake up, you drunkards, and weep!
    Wail, all you drinkers of wine;
wail because of the new wine,
    for it has been snatched from your lips.
⁶ A nation has invaded my land,
    a mighty army without number;
it has the teeth of a lion,
    the fangs of a lioness.
⁷ It has laid waste my vines
    and ruined my fig trees.
It has stripped off their bark
    and thrown it away,
    leaving their branches white.

⁸ Mourn like a virgin in sackcloth
    grieving for the betrothed of her youth.
⁹ Grain offerings and drink offerings
    are cut off from the house of the Lord.
The priests are in mourning,
    those who minister before the Lord.
¹⁰ The fields are ruined,
    the ground is dried up;
the grain is destroyed,
    the new wine is dried up,
    the olive oil fails.

¹¹ Despair, you farmers,
    wail, you vine growers;
grieve for the wheat and the barley,
    because the harvest of the field is destroyed.
¹² The vine is dried up
    and the fig tree is withered;
the pomegranate, the palm and the apple^[b] tree—
    all the trees of the field—are dried up.
Surely the people’s joy
    is withered away.

¹³ Put on sackcloth, you priests, and mourn;
    wail, you who minister before the altar.
Come, spend the night in sackcloth,
    you who minister before my God;
for the grain offerings and drink offerings
    are withheld from the house of your God.
¹⁴ Declare a holy fast;
    call a sacred assembly.
Summon the elders
    and all who live in the land
to the house of the Lord your God,
    and cry out to the Lord.

¹⁵ Alas for that day!
    For the day of the Lord is near;
    it will come like destruction from the Almighty.^[c]

¹⁶ Has not the food been cut off
    before our very eyes—
joy and gladness
    from the house of our God?
¹⁷ The seeds are shriveled
    beneath the clods.^[d]
The storehouses are in ruins,
    the granaries have been broken down,
    for the grain has dried up.
¹⁸ How the cattle moan!
    The herds mill about
because they have no pasture;
    even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

¹⁹ To you, Lord, I call,
    for fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness
    and flames have burned up all the trees of the field.
²⁰ Even the wild animals pant for you;
    the streams of water have dried up
    and fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness.

2 Blow the trumpet in Zion;
    sound the alarm on my holy hill.

Let all who live in the land tremble,
    for the day of the Lord is coming.
It is close at hand—
²     a day of darkness and gloom,
    a day of clouds and blackness.
Like dawn spreading across the mountains
    a large and mighty army comes,
such as never was in ancient times
    nor ever will be in ages to come.

³ Before them fire devours,
    behind them a flame blazes.
Before them the land is like the garden of Eden,
    behind them, a desert waste—
    nothing escapes them.
⁴ They have the appearance of horses;
    they gallop along like cavalry.
⁵ With a noise like that of chariots
    they leap over the mountaintops,
like a crackling fire consuming stubble,
    like a mighty army drawn up for battle.

⁶ At the sight of them, nations are in anguish;
    every face turns pale.
⁷ They charge like warriors;
    they scale walls like soldiers.
They all march in line,
    not swerving from their course.
⁸ They do not jostle each other;
    each marches straight ahead.
They plunge through defenses
    without breaking ranks.
⁹ They rush upon the city;
    they run along the wall.
They climb into the houses;
    like thieves they enter through the windows.

¹⁰ Before them the earth shakes,
    the heavens tremble,
the sun and moon are darkened,
    and the stars no longer shine.
¹¹ The Lord thunders
    at the head of his army;
his forces are beyond number,
    and mighty is the army that obeys his command.
The day of the Lord is great;
    it is dreadful.
    Who can endure it?

Purpose:  Beginning a Prayer Meeting series dealing with the Minor Prophets, here introducing Joel’s call to repentance.

Keywords:          Bible Study         Judgment            Repentance

Timeline/Series:               Minor Prophets                Sequential

Introduction

                One thing is sure, the author, Joel, called the “son of Pethuel” has witnessed a frightsome event and he likens it to the “day of the Lord” (2:1).  Little is known about him other than his fixation on the priesthood, and the region surrounding Jerusalem.  There is no scriptural documentation.  Other Joels are mentioned (I Chronicles 5:54), but nothing is found to tie them to this Joel.

                The name means “Jehovah (or the Lord) is God.”  His name probably does mean that he came from a family, whether out of Reuben as some believe, or out of Jerusalem herself, that worshipped the Lord God.

                When he wrote is anybody’s guess.  Pre-20^th Century scholarship favored a pre-exilic view.  He is positioned with Hosea and Amos among first mentioned prophets.  Amos and Hosea are  known from the 8^th Century B.C..  The enemy nations are the Philistines, Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Edomites.  However, these were enemies after the captivity as well.

                The lack of a reigning king fits the time when Joash was made king at age 7 (II Kings 11:21f).  The priests actually governed the people.

                But such circumstance fits a post-exilic date as well.  There was no king.  The priests ruled.  The enemies were no longer Assyria and Babylon.  But the message does not depend upon the selection of a date.

                It is important to decide if the text is apocalyptic, allegorical, or actual.  Those who take the first position say the locusts represent the enemies of God’s people in the end times.  The allegorical view would represent these locusts as the traditional enemies of Israel.  To see an actual locust invasion is to see Joel describing a natural event as an actual intervention of God to bring the people to repentance.

                II Chronicles 21-22 may describe the period.  Jehoram, fifth from Solomon, was a wicked king.  There was a carrying away of people and possessions by enemies (II Chronicles 21:17).  At Jehoram’s death, Ahaziah, his youngest son, became king.  He was assassinated by Jehu, and his mother, Athaliah, ascended the throne.  It was she who killed the royal sons, only to have Joash hidden by the priests.

I.             Successive Plagues and Drought, Joel 1:1-20.  V4 “That  which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpillar eaten.”  It is a scene of total destruction.  Who has seen it before? Who will see its equal again?

                The different names are thought to be the various stages in the life cycle. William Thomson was a 19^th Century American missionary who worked for 25 years in Ottoman Syria.  He writes in The Land and the Book: “Their number was astounding; the whole face of the  mountain was black with them.  On they came like a living deluge. . . .  It was perfectly appalling as we watched this animated river as it flowed up the road, and ascended the hill above my house.  For four days they continued to pass on toward the east . . . they devoured every green thing . . . .  The noise they made in marching and foraging was like that of a heavy shower on a distant forest. . . .  They all pursue the same line of march, like a disciplined army.”

                The effect of all of this will be felt throughout  the land.  Desolation was as of a drunkard denied  his bottle, v5.  Despair was as of the young bride whose husband-to-be dies on her wedding day, v8.  Desperation was as that of the farmer  whose crops are destroyed at harvest, v11.

                Thus, Joel issues his first call for repentance, v13-15.  It is directed first to priests.  The elders are to be brought together.  The people are to assemble in “the  house of the Lord.”  It would be a “solemn day,” v14, a day to “cry out” danger.

                Don’t lightheartedly pass over the semblance of the “house” of God.

                Thus, in this context, Joel perceives “a day of the Lord.”  He was given “the word of the Lord,” v1.  He senses that word has directed him to an event, and the people are to be warned.  Is it the activity of God’s righteous indignation?  Is it man’s abuse bringing recompense on his own head?

                The news told of the plight of an Australian sheepherder.  Animals were dying by the hundreds. There was a caption with a picture of thousands of  thirst-ravaged livestock: “Why doesn’t God hear their prayer? Who brought them to a dire land in such numbers that their needs could not be met?”

II.            This “Day of the Lord” is Imminent, v 2:1-11.  “For the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand.”  The meaning of the phrase:  The prophets used this term of deliberate intervention by God—popularly, it was used of God’s intervention to bless Israel, curse their enemies.  Amos used it as Joel here: “Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! . . . The day of the Lord is darkness, and not light.”  It is a day of judgment and justice.

                Joel uses the phrase five times: In relation to an event (1:15); as a symbol of a coming judgment (2:1,11)—also v31:  “The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into ‘blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord’”; as a warning that personal response is required, v3:14—“Multitudes,  multitudes in the valley of decision or the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision.”

III.           A Parenthetical Call to Repentance is Issued.  V1f “Turn ye even to me with all your heart, . . . rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful.”  Disasters of the gravest magnitude may be circumscribed, v13.  Their “turning” must be acceptable—from the Hebrew “shub,” for returning. It appears over 1000 times in the Old Testament, 111 by Jeremiah.  The same word is used in v14 of God.

                Religious pretension without heart performance is hypocritical and useless.  God has the power to act in response to our faith.  The people of faith and covenant must act: Observe a feast (v15); gather together for declaration of unity (v15, 16); forgo personal liberties and pleasures, v16b. Let the priests express before God the will of the people for intervention.

*continued at #40*

THINKING SOBERLY

#033 (use with #784)                                   THINKING SOBERLY                                                                                          

Scripture  Romans 12:1-10, 21 NIV                                                                                                Orig. 9-20-64 (11-75)

                                                                                                                                                                                   Rewr. 9-28-90 

Passage:              Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. ² Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

³ For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. ⁴ For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, ⁵ so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. ⁶ We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your^[a] faith; ⁷ if it is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; ⁸ if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then give generously; if it is to lead,^[b] do it diligently; if it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.

⁹ Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. ¹⁰ Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.

²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Purpose:              On the last Sunday of the church year, to remind my people of our need to give freely of ourselves for the glory of God in the new year.

Keywords:          Commitment     Offering               Sacrifice               Suffering

Timeline/Series:               New Year

Introduction

                It was Victor Hugo, I believe, who once described heaven as a place “where all the parents are young, and all the children are small.”  I think I can understand the point that he was making.

                The ones who are least likely to grasp this are young parents themselves.  For others of us, however, it is quite impossible to look with anything other than nostalgia upon those days when our own children were small.  What a treasure trove of delights those days now bring to mind.  Oh, yes, there were days made weary by the wants and waywardness of those little ones. And, yes, the nights were sometimes made long with wakefulness.  There are even some who have had to look death in its ugly face. 

                But surely, there are none of us so insensitive, that this lovable bundle of frail humanity was not a constant source of surprise and joy.  The truly loving parent,  however, would be the last to deny to this child the right and privilege of growing to personal fulfillment in adulthood.

                If, as the Bible suggests, we get our start in the kingdom as “babes” (I Peter 2:2), as spiritual infants, then, the object of our being is to mature.  The “Will of God” for His every child is for this one who was a baby to grow to become what they are capable of becoming.

                While it may be nostalgic to smile with the concept of  “child-like faith,” it is realistic to see grown-up people dealing with grown-up problems, from a Christian perspective.  That’s what “thinking soberly” is all about.

I.             We Begin with an Appeal to Sensitivity.  “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God.”  The appeal takes note that individual freedom is not denied.  You see, our response to God does not come mechanically.  It is not automatically in-bred.  We don’t get it from our genes.  At her school in New Orleans, Ann was teaching about basic genetics.  She had Terry and Jerry, identical twins, in her class.  She said, “Terry and Jerry are twins because their genes match.”  An eager student helpfully said, “And their shirts!”

                We do,  however, learn a great deal, positive and negative, from moms and dads.

                Paul does not here assume that they are doing all they can.  He affirms from personal experience.  He remembers out of his pilgrimage.  “Beseech” is the verb form (paraclesis) of parakletos (John 14:26), or “Comforter.”  In Luke 2:25 Simeon is “waiting for the Consolation.” 

It is a call for willful response based on one’s redeemed heart’s longing.  It is such response that purges the heart of unworthy thought and motive.  Remember that Paul went “into Arabia” (Galatians 1:6) after his conversion.  The question with which we must deal is of the desire of our hearts to sustain our professions as Christians. 

We remember great Cowboy teams of the 1970’s.  Coach Landry had two superstars sitting on the bench, Bob Hayes and Craig Morton.  A reporter asked “Why?”  Landry gave three reasons: “They do not stay current on plays.  They are not consistent when they perform.  They are not committed to winning.”

You see, the nature of the appeal assumes that an experience with Christ has occurred. 

The first perspective of living the Christian life is our perspective of Christ.  Tell me what you think of Christ, I will know what kind of life you live.  Jesus defines hypocrisy (Matthew 23), saying that the one not at peace with God is like a whitewashed sepulcher, a death vessel.  Without the converting experience, the appeal would have been to dead men.

We are free: But Christ holds the key TO PEACE WITH GOD.

We are free: But Christ holds the key to growth as Christians.

It is the desire of God’s heart.

II.            We Must Next Describe the Affirmation of Sacrifice. “I beseech  you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies, a living sacrifice.”  Admittedly, this is in the context of a message to an entire church.  It will not be resolved by a committee.  A highfalutin Board of Deacons will not authorize it.  The staff will not scrutinize programs and work toward this one.  It is a decision to be made by individual believers.

                The language used here is that of animal sacrifice.  I remind you that the Old Testament practice was based on offering a life to God, not a dead carcass.  That’s why the emphasis is on the blood.  Of the many vulgarities of Satanism, it majors on death, not life.

                The mind of God is ours to know in relation to sacrifice.  Isaiah 1:11 “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me?”  Hosea 6:6 “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.”  Amos 5:21f “I hate, I despise your feast days. . . .  Let judgment run down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

                The death of Christ becomes a case in point.  God was willing to surrender His own son’s life for a greater good.  So, begin to listen with your heart as with your ears.  John 1:29 “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.”  I Corinthians 5:7 “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.” I Peter 1:19 “With the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without a blemish, spotless.” 

The death of Jesus begins to have meaning only as we give of ourselves in response.  The measure of our sacrifice is the MEASURE of our faith.

Paul suggests four ways to assess our own lives: How we live—as long as life remains; Sacrifice—my life for another’s; Holiness—duty to God, others, and self; Acceptability—judged by the JUDGE.

Recall the example of Lot.  With Abraham, decisions were made for him.  On his own, however, he faced the hard choice of dying with his hands full of emptiness, or living in response to God.

This will be a good place to say a word about the election.  The demand of the bramble of this world is always to “put [our] trust in” shadows.

III.           Thinking Soberly, then, Brings Us to the Attainment of Service.  “Present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”  Notice it says nothing about extraordinary commitment here.  It addresses reflecting faith in the way we live.  It speaks of the satisfaction of a morally upright life:  Psalm 69:6 “Let not them that wait on thee, O Lord God of hosts, be ashamed for my sake: Let not those that seek thee be confounded for my sake, O God of Israel.”  Not only church staff members: deacons, teachers, others, as well.

                It is a lifestyle that is unattainable without being into the word.  That is the litmus test.  Philippians 2:13 “It is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.”  Psalm 62:11 “The Lord gave the word.”

Conclusion

                We are all familiar with the children’s story of the little Dutch boy who plugged the hole in the dike with his finger and thus spared his homeland.  There was epic drama behind that story, however, for there were times when Dutchmen hurled their own bodies into the gaps of the weakening dikes, averting real-life disasters.

                Spiritual dikes are being threatened today as never before.  Some of the storms are alien, from far, distant places.  Others are brought upon us by our own kind through apathy and indolence on our part.

CHANGES IN THE WIND

#023                                                               CHANGES IN THE WIND                                                                                      

Scripture  I Corinthians 15:35-58 NIV                                                                                                            Orig. 8-18-63

                                                                                                                                                                                  Rewr. 3-29-89 

Passage:  ³⁵ But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” ³⁶ How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. ³⁷ When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. ³⁸ But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. ³⁹ Not all flesh is the same: People have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. ⁴⁰ There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. ⁴¹ The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.

⁴² So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; ⁴³ it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; ⁴⁴ it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.  If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. ⁴⁵ So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”^[a]; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. ⁴⁶ The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. ⁴⁷ The first man was of the dust of the earth; the second man is of heaven. ⁴⁸ As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. ⁴⁹ And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we^[b] bear the image of the heavenly man.

⁵⁰ I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. ⁵¹ Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— ⁵² in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. ⁵³ For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. ⁵⁴ When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”^[c]

⁵⁵ “Where, O death, is your victory?
    Where, O death, is your sting?”^[d]

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷ But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸ Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Purpose:   Continuing a study for Prayer Meeting out of the epistle to the Corinthians.

Keywords:          Bible study          Resurrection

Timeline/Series:               I Corinthians

Introduction

                Twice a year we notice instantly the changes taking place all around us.  Last Winter we observed the deterioration of nature.  Where there had been beautiful flowers, only spindly stalks remained.  Where vegetable gardens had produced food for our tables, only a few sparse weeds staked their claims under the diminishing sun.  Where trees had spontaneously graced our lives with shade, all that remained was leaf litter to be gathered and burned.  But change had occurred.

                Change has come once more.  From the lifelessness of Winter there is beginning to emerge the incandescent beauty of Spring.  Dogwood, azaleas, tulips abound, and share their joy all around.

                Change is natural.  But something beyond the natural is God’s gift to the redeemed.  Paul is determined to share the uplift of this victory.

I.             Raising Some Oft Asked Questions.  V35 “How are the dead raised? And with what manner of body do they come?”  The Jews deliberated such questions.  They are questions about the resurrection body.  The rabbis windily debated these.

                The  Greeks did not believe in a bodily resurrection.  They believed in the immortality of the soul.  The body of flesh was the house of sin. 

                The text exemplifies the resurrection body.  Such debating is foolish.  Death is the natural corridor through which such life begins.  Not speaking as a botanist, but a plant dies and produces seed, which germinates to form life.  There are variances throughout creation:  The flesh of man as beast leads to the glory of bodies terrestrial and celestial.

                Thus, resurrection is the ultimate hope. There are four antitheses:

a) The perishable vs. the imperishable—Romans 8:21 “The creature . . . shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.”

b) Humiliation vs. glory—Philippians 3:21, “Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body. . . .”

c) Weakness vs. power—II Corinthians 12:9, “My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

d) Physical vs. spiritual—There are two supreme thoughts here:  that the physical body belongs to all, and that the spiritual body belongs to the redeemed.

II.            A  Vital Difference Between the Two Adams.  V45 “The first man Adam became a living soul, the last Adam a life-giving spirit.” 

                The first Adam is a man of dust, destined to return to the ground, and with a nature that guarantees only a grave.  Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.  PBS’s Nova ran a story about the concentration, highest in the world, of Huntington’s Disease in villages along the shores of Lake Maracaibo. This neurological disease is always fatal, and the program was called “The Killer Gene.”

                Christ is not a man of such nature, but a man of heaven.  Spiritual bodies are for those who share His nature.  Romans 8:29 “to be conformed to the image of His Son.” 

III.           The Mystery of the End-Time.  V51 “Behold I tell you a mystery.  We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.”  There is a mystery to be declared. It has a different connotation from I Corinthians 14:2, which is about the mystery of speaking in tongues.  There the idea is secretiveness.  Here one thinks of unveiling.

                Here it involves immortality. In Greek, athanasia means to deny death, euthanasia means “easy death.”  Man’s immortality is not natural, but by grace.  Hosea 13:14 “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death.”

                Christ is the One in whom is victory.

A HOPE THAT IS WONDERFUL

#021                                                        A  HOPE THAT IS WONDERFUL                                                                               

Scripture  Romans 8:18-39 NIV                                                                                                                       Orig. 7-15-62

                                                                                                                                                                                  Rewr. 3-21-85 

Passage:  ¹⁸ I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. ¹⁹ For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that^[a] the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. ²² We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. ²³ Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? ²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. ²⁶ In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. ²⁷ And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. ²⁸ And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who^[b] have been called according to his purpose. ²⁹ For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. ³⁰ And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. ³¹ What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? ³³ Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. ³⁴ Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. ³⁵ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ³⁶ As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
    we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”^[c]

³⁷ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,^[d] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹ neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Purpose:  Continuing a series from Romans, define for my people that wonderful hope that is in Christ.

Keywords:          God       Sovereignty       Hope    Holy Spirit

Timeline/Series:               Romans

Introduction

                I read recently the story of a young writer who believed that he had composed the classic short story.  He was persuaded that it was the best that he could do.  Though the plot was not original, the young man felt that it was a masterpiece of realism.

                One day he was introduced to a famous author, and to his delight, the old man asked his new friend to come to his study and read his manuscript to him.

                The story was about the only son of a poor widow living in a cottage nesting in a Pennsylvania valley.  The boy decided to go to the city to seek his fortune.  The  mother, in true motherly form, saw him off saying, “Now remember son, if you ever get into trouble,  no matter how bad it is, you set off home and as you come over the hill, you’ll always find a light burning in this window—and I’ll be waiting to welcome you.”

                As the young author read his manuscript he told the young man’s story.  It was one of decline and fall into debauchery and crime.  After a time in prison, and after his release, he decided it was time to return to the old home place.  He came finally to the only hill that remained between himself and his home.  As he walked over the crest and looked down, there was the outline of the old cottage in the evening gloom, but no light burning in the window.

                The old author, who had listened intently all the while, leaped quickly to his feet and cried: “You young devil, put that light back.”  That light represented hope.   As long as it remained, then the remoteness of the story did not matter.

I.             A Hope that is Wonderful Defines the Human Struggle.  V22f “For we know that the whole creation groans in labor pains together until now.  And not only they, but we also who have the firstfruits of the Spirit.”  We must first link with the prior message.  V16 The Holy Spirit confirms human spirit.  We are therefore God’s children—heirs. Heirship is fulfilled only at death.  As another thread in the tapestry of eternity, death becomes less frightening. In 1939 Lou Gehrig said of his illness:  "Fans, for the past two weeks, you've been reading about a bad break. Today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.” In 2 Corinthians 10:15 Paul wrote “When I am weak, then I am strong.”

Oneness with Christ is ours.

In this sense, Paul confirms human suffering.  Whatever the struggle, it is less overpowering beholding what is to be.  All of us know someone in the throes of some deep agony.  How much easier when there is a supportive family.  What a difference friends can make.

Paul says (V19) “creation” will be better off for man’s struggle to redemption.  Natural man brings nature to the brink.  PBS, in “Passion to Protect,” reported than 1 in 1000 animal species becomes extinct through a natural event, once a month through a man-made event.

Misuse of chemicals are creating a far-ranging problem. An article published 3-20-85 reported that it was a pesticide chemical that caused the death of 2,000 people in Bhopal, India. 

Man’s spiritual redemption, cosmos out of chaos, is nature’s hope also.  Hope (v20) is not God’s hope.  It is man’s hope, nature’s hope.  With God there can be nothing less than absolute certainly.  The struggle is of divine ordination.  The world may be in its birth pains, V22—tsunami, earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, etc.  Man is in his coming to oneness with God.

II.            A Hope that is Wonderful Describes the Spirit’s Intercession. (V26-27).  V26 “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses.  For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us.”  It is intercession in prayer.  He doesn't do our praying for us.  When burdens stymie prayer, He comes to our rescue.  It is not intercession when we are not praying, but when we can’t pray. 

It is intercession in weakness. We are trying to impress others with our strengths. But “when I am weak, then I am strong.” The Holy Spirit comes in our weakness. Helps (V26)—sunantilambanomai, “to take hold of with another.”  Ever tried to pick up a wheelbarrow by the handles?  Even if a friend takes one of the handles?  We need a helper who understands the problem.  For instance, the best marriages are often those where weaknesses are known, understood, and accepted.  It is intercession seeking compliance with the will of God.  “According to [the will of] God” V27 is surely the sense of the verse: 2 Corinthians 10:15: “Not boasting of things without our measure, that is, of other men’s labours; but having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you according to our rule abundantly.”

III.           A Hope that is Wonderful Explains God’s Sovereignty V26-28.  V28 “And we know that all things work together for good to those who are called according to his purpose.”  Not some pantheism by which we are elected if all goes well with us.  Not some theistic “chance.”  2 Samuel 7:28 “And now, O Lord God, You are God, and Your words are true, and You have promised this goodness to Your servant.” It is God active in the framework of history.  Acts 17:24-28 at Mars Hill: “He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their habitation” (V26).  God guides that history by those who cooperate with His purpose, just as we must seek to pray for the Spirit to intercede.

As we “faith” events around us, we are “working together” with God.  “Purpose” translates “a placing before.”  It is to establish priorities.  V. 29-30 contain God’s loving purpose for the Christian.  “Foreknew”—to know before hand; “predestinate”—horizon—to set a limit, “confirmed to the image of His Son”; “called”—all are called,  those who respond are certified; “justified”—legal and formal acquittal; “glorified”—bring to a promised place of honor.

IV.          A Hope that is Wonderful Exemplifies Christ’s Substitution (VV 31-39).  V32 “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not also freely give us all things?"  We are redeemed by this substitutionary work of Christ.  In Him we are God’s own dear children.  He doesn’t love others less.  His love is personalized by response as John was “the Disciple whom Jesus loved.”  To be in Christ is to be uncondemned (V34).  To be in Christ is forever (V39).

Closing

                We had a couple of pianos tuned recently.  Did you ever wonder how they do it in big chuches where they have lots of pianos?  How would it be to tune the first, and then to tune each succeeding one to the one just finished?  Would the twenty be in harmony with the first? No, in no way!

                Our two were tuned with a tuning fork.  If one had two hundred to be tuned, they would all require tuning with the same tuning fork. 

                This wonderful hope, of which we have spoken, is “in Christ.”  It is up to each of us to rest in Him to have this hope.

WHEN GOD BECAME MAN

#012                                                           WHEN GOD BECAME MAN

Scripture Matthew 2:1-6                                                                                                                                 Orig. 12-19-71

                                                                                                                                                                                Rewr. 12-14-76 

Passage:  After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written: “ ‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

Introduction

                To contemplate the birth of Jesus, one must also consider that earlier birth of a planet, and birth of the generic man upon that planet.  Back in the day when pollution was unknown, and ecology was unnecessary, man lived in what was a veritable Garden of Eden.

                Of the little that we do know about that place, there is this fact about man’s beginnings.  Around him were many trees.  Of two of these we know the names—the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge.  Imagination tells us what might have been names of other trees—virtue, strength, love, faith, obedience, trust, fidelity, honor.  It was the tree of knowledge that man was disallowed any access.

                You must be aware that there is a suitable recourse to knowledge when life is adequately lived.  By having life, man can achieve knowledge.  To have knowledge, however, is never any guarantee for life.

                Thus, when man chose knowledge and rejected life, a rerouting of man’s priority became necessary.  That rerouting ordered by God is declared in the story of the birth of Jesus.  “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sin.”

                And in His birth it is again declared—“I am come that you might have life, and that you might have it more abundantly.”

                The birth of Jesus, then, was not an historical declarative, but a contemporary imperative. And it was more.  It was when God became man.

I.             When God Became Man, There was Submission to the Limitations of the Flesh. He experienced extreme physical privation.  A prince born in a cattle stall—the wise men honored a king; the priests looked for a king; The Word foretold a king.  But even earthly kings are not so treated.  I remember the birth of England’s Prince.  The throngs waited amid regal glories for the natal hour.  I remember when the College of Cardinals elected a Pope.  I remember election night 1968.  I remember last evening, when the winning democrat pictured himself elected.

                Was such privation necessary for the “Tiny King?”  You remember, I am sure, that Satan promised Jesus the kingdoms of this world if Jesus would worship him.  But you must remember that this is a betrayal of trust.  The kingdoms of which he spoke were those of the King of Kings, and not Lord of Lords.  This KING, and no tiny king is HE, came to help man find His way back to God.  The king must be One with the subject who will honor Him.  Hebrews 4:15: “We have a high priest who feels our infirmities.”  His life and His ministry were to make it easier for man to believe—to reroute his priorities.

                This privation experience is necessary for us as well. We must die to the flesh, live unto God. Matthew 18:3 “Except you become as little children, you shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven.”

II.            When God Became Man, There was Surrender of All of the Divine Attributes.  The power of God did not cease to be operative in the universe.  But in Jesus, God Himself, became the deliverer, the sin bearer, the rerouter of man’s priorities.

                Let’s be sure about our concept of a deliverer.  Television and movies have given us what is a poor substitute for the real thing.  There is always the same plot.  The father can’t or won’t pay the rent, the damsel won’t agree to the landlord’s proposal (it used to be one of marriage), so he ties her to the railroad track to await the hero sweeping in to deliver.  May I call your attention to the Biblical concept—He was wounded for our transgressions.  He was bruised for our iniquity.  The chastisement of our peace was upon Him.  With His stripes we are healed.  Even with His manliness, there was no compromise with purity and virtue. Hebrews 4:15 In all points He was tempted as we are, yet without sin.

III.           When God Became Man, There was Subordination to the Holy Spirit.  It was as Jesus accepted the fact of God’s Will that He was empowered to accomplish it.  The hard fact of Jesus’ life was that He was willing to pay whatever price necessary to honor His heavenly Father—not human parents;  not national heritage, not unborn multitudes; certainly not the human blood suckers who demand that we be like they are or a little worse.  It is in the context of our willingness to honor our heavenly Father that we may be empowered for our task.  May. May. May… The doubt is not in God’s ability, but in our will.  John 14:12 “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and greater works than these because I go to the Father.”

Conclusion

                I read recently an account of a lady in the frontier days of the old west who came to the attitude of dependence upon the Holy Spirit.  She lived with her husband in a mining town when gold fever was very high. 

                Someone told of an old prospector who lived alone in a shack back of town in the hills.  He was dying.  But about such a mean and vile man, no one cared.  She went to him when no one would even go with her.  He cursed her for coming.  At the mention of mother, he cursed her.  At mention of wife, he cursed her.  After several visits she despaired to go again.  Her little boy said “You didn’t pray.  Have you given up? Has God given up?” She spent a night agonizing in prayer.  She started visiting with a neighbor and her daughter.  The little girl’s laugh became the key to the old man’s heart.

                Our trouble is that we get bleary eyed and beatific over the birth of Bethlehem’s babe.  Then after Christmas, we just revert to our old thinking about living among all of those agnostics and we are afraid to let them know that Christ is out of the manger and in our hearts.

THE SEVENTH ANGEL SOUNDED

#009                                                       THE SEVENTH ANGEL SOUNDED                                                                             

Scripture Revelation 11:15                                                                                                                    Orig. Date 12/9/73

Passage:  15 The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said:

“The kingdom of the world has become
    the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah,
    and he will reign for ever and ever.”

Introduction

                When Jesus went into Jerusalem shortly before His death, there came out to greet Him hundreds of interested and curious citizens.  They prepared for His coming simply by placing palm branches along the way.  They stood there shouting their “hosannahs” as He passed by.  All of the outward signs were signs of acceptance and belief, but only a few days had passed before Jesus faced death at the hands of an angry mob.

                Within the lifetime of many of us, we have  had a similar event.  About thirty years ago American and other Allied soldiers moved back onto the continent of Europe.  Citizens of European countries, which had been under “der Fuhrer’s heel,” were free again.  As these allied  troops began the trek across Europe, time and again they were greeted by masses of people.  They waited on the outskirts of their towns and villages for their liberators.  It would not be long, however, before the scars of war would have healed and the brave deeds of courageous men would be forgotten.

                But we are quick to point out that the Nazarene has not been forgotten.  In fact, for the next few weeks, we are going to be very  busy remembering.  The next two Sunday nights, many of us will be here in the sanctuary rejoicing at the sounds of Christmas music.  The preacher will stand to preach, and his messages will center themselves around the birth of Christ.  And that’s not all.  Some of us have already put up our trees.  They are standing there with or without lights, gaily decorated, saying to all who enter, “We celebrate the birth of Jesus here.”  Underneath the tree, either there are or there will be the gaudily packaged gifts of friendship and love.  Is this not proof enough that we hold with the One who taught us that it is better to give than to receive?

                Yes, we remember these brave soldiers of thirty years ago, and we remember the Galilean of two  thousand years ago.  Let it be noted, however, that we await only the sounding of the seventh angel’s trumpet, and all that will be remembered will be the Christ and His Kingdom, and His efforts to bring us into it.

I.             The Seventh Angel Signals the End of This World’s Kingdoms.  Be reminded of the kingdom of self.  When the seventh angel sounds, the kingdom of self will be no more.

                Little description is needed.  We know it well.  There are many who serve in this kingdom.  It doesn’t make brothers of us.  The Christian has no fetish to keep him from paying homage to this dissolute regent.  This is the one place in the human spectrum where Satan is satisfied with second place.

                It was this regard for self that drove Adam out of Paradise, Lucifer from the throne room of God, Saul from the seat of majesty as one of the great kings of Israel, Haman from the court of King Ahasuerus, and Judas from the brotherhood of Jesus.

                Be as well reminded of the kingdom of sin.  When the seventh angel sounds, the kingdom of sin will be no more. 

                Again, little description is needed.  We all know the image of the picture which sin provides.

                “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Romans 3:23

                 “Your righteousness is as filthy rags.” Isaiah 64:6

                We all know how capable we are in detecting sin in the lives of others.  But we also know the scathing denunciation of Jesus upon those who would set themselves up as judges.  “Thou hypocrite, if you really want to acknowledge the speck of dust in your friend’s eye, then first get the boulder out of your own eye.”  Matthew 7:5. 

                I am inclined to think that we may miss the point of the matter.  Whether the analogy of the sin in our lives is speck or boulder, splinter or log, the point is, we can’t do anything about either.  When we knowingly enter the kingdom of sin, we can never be sure where it will end.

                There is a third kingdom of which we must be forewarned—the kingdom of service.  When the  seventh angel sounds, the kingdom of service will be no more.

                While many of us know all about the kingdoms of self and sin,  most of us know little about the kingdom of service.  Be reminded that it is difficult to isolate the true ideals of service.  The vice president resigns.  The president-elect of C. of C. is indicted.  Even paragons of virtue have feet of clay.

II.            The Seventh Angel Signals the Consummation of the Kingdom of Christ.  His kingdom is the kingdom of love.  Love is the language of communication there.  “God is love, and he that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him.” I John 4:16.

                It is the kingdom of Christian experience.  “Though I speak with the tongues of men, of angels even, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a clanging symbol.” I Corinthians 13:1.  Noise alone asserts neither style, nor skill, nor depth of feeling.

                It is the kingdom of change by growth.  I have not been able to establish unquestioned authenticity, but I have read that there is a disease called “marasmus,” that is said to be “the disease of  being not loved.”  It is a gradual wasting away of the body, especially in infants and elderly people.

                It is the kingdom of peace.  Longfellow wrote one of the most beautiful of all Christmas poems.  Having been set to music we enjoy it during this season as one of the most popular songs of Christmas.

I heard the bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play,

And wild and sweet the words repeat, of “peace on earth, good will to men.”

I thought how as the day had come, the belfries of all Christendom

Had rolled along the unbroken song of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head, “There is no peace on earth,” I said,

“For hate is strong and mocks the song of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep, “God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.”

The wrong shall fail, the right prevail, with peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way, the world revolved from night to day,

A voice, a chime, a chant sublime, of peace on earth, good will to men.

So be here reminded that this kingdom is the kingdom of eternal values.

III.           In Addition to the Kingdom, There is Also to be Considered the Capabilities of the King.  In His providence He transforms.  He didn’t start over (though there were times when He had cause to): In the garden with Adam; In the wilderness with the Hebrew nation; In the divided kingdom with Jeroboam and Rehoboam; In Rome with the Holy Catholic Church; In America with the evangelical church.  He MADE over.

                In His love, He redeemed.  The Hebrew nation in Jesus’ day looked for a redemption from God.  It was based on hope and faith.  It was a false hope however, for it anticipated an earthly king.  In what king of redemption have we put our trust? A babe in Bethlehem. In Him whose name shall be called “wonderful, counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father the Prince of Peace.”

                In His power He sustains and keeps the believer.

Closing

                You may have recognized the words of our text as being a part of the most famous of all Christmas oratorios, Handel’s Messiah.  The message so stirred a king, George II, that he stood to salute the majesty of the work.

                This composition which took Handel only twenty-five days to prepare, has stood for 230 years as the human mark of the excellence of that coming kingdom.  The music has outlasted the crown and the scepter of the one who acclaimed its genius.  But justice cannot be done to the kingdom itself in the words and music of men.  When the seventh angel sounds the trumpet, the “kingdoms of this world will become the Kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever.”

THE PROPHECIES OF CHRISTMAS

#014                                                      THE PROPHECIES OF CHRISTMAS                                                                             

Scripture  Matthew 2:1-23                                                                                                                Orig. 8-25-63 (12-77)

                                                                                                                                                                               Rewr. 12-18=86 

Passage:

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi^[a] from the east came to Jerusalem ² and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”  ³ When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. ⁴ When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. ⁵ “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:

⁶ “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
    are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for out of you will come a ruler
    who will shepherd my people Israel.’^[b]”

⁷ Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. ⁸ He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”  ⁹ After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. ¹⁰ When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. ¹¹ On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. ¹² And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

¹³ When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”  ¹⁴ So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, ¹⁵ where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”^[c]

¹⁶ When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. ¹⁷ Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

¹⁸ “A voice is heard in Ramah,
    weeping and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children
    and refusing to be comforted,
    because they are no more.”^[d]

¹⁹ After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt ²⁰ and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.”

²¹ So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. ²² But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, ²³ and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.

Purpose: To share a Christmas message drawing from the great prophecies about Christ and His birth.

Keywords:          Biographical, Joseph                       Messiah               Prophecy                             Christ, Birth

Timeline/Series:               Christmas

Introduction

                It  has been more than thirty  years since I first drove north out of Alexandria on the highway that fronts church property.  That first trip through the pine forests of central Louisiana was with the young woman who would become my wife, to meet her parents.  Because four pastorates and twenty years would be spent in the central and southern parts of our state, that highway would  be one “much traveled by.”

                We watched many changes.  Since much of it was in the National Forest, only as we approached the towns were there indications of people’s changing ways.  But even the forest changed.  An occasional tree hugging the right of way would be gone.  Places where the tree harvester plied his trade were in evidence.  We would see the void, where trees had been.  Next, the denuded landscape.  But by the next trip north, preseedlings would be in the ground beginning their inexorable growth.

                There were human changes as well.  At a central stopping place there was a break we regularly took.  It was a restaurant operated by a happy, God-fearing family man.  His daughters were grown and occasionally worked in the business.  His pride in them showed, not only in the pictures that adorned the walls.

                A much younger son was seen occasionally, and then over years, less and less.  He grew up during those years.  Graduated from Winnfield High School, went on to LSU, graduated there I believe, and became a pilot.  Then, on a later trip, Mr. Mercer told us that he was in Viet Nam.  An article in the Alexandria paper while we were still in Oakdale revealed that the young man was dead, shot down serving his country.

                The restaurant was still open on our next journey or two north, but things were not the same.  He, of happy countenance and friendly greeting, was not to be seen.  Then came the inevitable day, and a black, gloomy sign which read “Closed.”  It was understood that it also meant, “Not to be reopened.”  I do not recall whether other interests tried to make the Goat Castle thrive again.  I only know that it could not have been.  Now, the corner is marred by the memory of what was, and what is, and by what now occupies the corner on the south edge of Winnfield.

                It is a high price to pay to give one’s son, even if the cause is that in which one believes.  God gave His Son, knowing full well that for Him to be born would also be to die.  That’s an even higher price.

I.             There Is the Foretelling of His Birth to Wise Men.  It is not a prophecy in the Biblical sense.  There is scriptural intonation.  Numbers 24:16f “The utterance of him . . . who sees the vision of the Almighty, . . . I see Him but not now; I behold  Him, but not near. A star shall come out of Jacob; a scepter shall rise out of Israel.”

                Zechariah offers an apocalyptic image.

                Other verses allude to wisdom of men out of the east.  I Kings 4:30 “Solomon’s wisdom excelled . . . the men of the east.”

                We know something, of course, of those people and their distant land:

• In the east was Babylon, today’s Iraq, in the Tigris/Euphrates valley.
• Isaac’s wife, Rebekah, came from Abraham’s homeland, Mesopotamia.
• Egypt was the land of captivity, where some Jews remained.
  • The gospel song reminds us of this time:  “Wade in the water; wade in the water, children; wade in the water: God’s gonna trouble the water.”
• Ur, home of Abraham, is near modern-day Kuwait, which rests precipitously at the Northwest extremity of the Persian Gulf. 
• Jerusalem was the land of Daniel (Daniel 9:24-25), who prophesied 70 weeks (or years) until the coming of the Messiah.

The presence of these wise men demands two significant considerations: That the Messiah was known outside of Israel, disarming this as a political P.R. event, and that God intended faith in His Son to be the great, universal, foundation stone upon which hope and peace would be built.  Micah 4:2 “And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.”  Zechariah 2:11 “And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto thee.”  Zechariah 8:23 “Thus saith the Lord of hosts; In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you.”

II.            There Is Prophecy Relative to Messiah’s Birth, Appearing Here As Questions of Those Men.  V2 “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?”  With all of their learning, there are yet surprises: Surprise that Herod knows not of this, that a king would be born away from Jerusalem, that the star will show them the very place of His birth, and that they would be “divinely warned” in a dream.

                But be very sure that the prophetic word of God knows no surprises. Micah 5:2 “But thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth that is to be ruler in Israel.”  The wise men asked about a king, but when Herod called on his own scholars, he inquired of “Messiah,” and of Bethlehem.

                At Bethlehem, the picture begins to form of God’s love.   Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the sky of parchment made; were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade: To write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry, Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky  (Frederick Lehman). 

                At Bethlehem also, we begin to discover the degree to which God will go for those He loves.  It took someone like Jesus to save us.  We dare not treat it lightly.

III.           The Forecast of Direction to Joseph for His Family.  V13 “. . . an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, ‘Arise, take . . . go . . . stay.”  It is not Father’s Day, but perhaps it is:  A time to assume  joys and responsibilities; a time to learn of Joseph’s example; a time to bring joy to the hearts of 20^th Century Marys; a time for deepening relationships, of the spiritual sort, and of family.  God spoke  to Joseph.  He can speak to us: Through a dream then, perhaps now.  He speaks indisputably through His Word.

                The climax is that of obedience.  V14 “. . . He arose, . . . took the young Child and his  mother by night and departed for Egypt.” Knowing in obedience is doing.  The message is that of God’s providence. 

This is the Joseph of momentous decisions.  When he learned of the baby there were three choices:  Accuse Mary before the elders; simply put her away (Deuteronomy 22:26—sometimes the woman is helpless); accept Mary, and her baby, shelter them both, love them, and see the wonders of God.

When God persists in a plan, He provides the resource.  Three wise men from the east traveled for perhaps five months to provide resources for Joseph and his family in Egypt.

                Wise men still seek Jesus.

IV.          There Is Foreboding of the Murder of Children.  V16 “Herod . . . sent forth and put to death all the male children who were in Bethlehem and in all its districts, from two years old and under.”

                Is it conceivable for one man to harbour such malice, suspicion, and fear?  But clearly, to the warped mind human life is just another expendable commodity, political not spiritual.  Besides that, it was not just another human life sought by Herod, not just another number recorded on the parchment of over-populated land mass.  This was the king/messiah they were asking about:  What is done with the old king when a new one asserts himself?

                There are still Herods about.  These people didn’t find Jeremiah’s prophecy all that shocking.  Nor did the people to whom Jeremiah spoke.  “A voice was heard in Ramah, . . . Rachel weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted, because they were no more” (Jeremiah 31:15).

                Such are not born that way, they become that way.  “Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad with power.”

                Christian social enterprise without Christ’s redemptive love is hate.  I read of the Mayas of Mesoamerica, and their trials chiefly through Spain’s lust for gold.  There were places in their own native land where they could not walk on the sidewalks until 1965.

Conclusion

                In these areas, the prophecies of Christmas chiefly speak.  They testify that God is at work, and that He is at work in the human world.  The prophetic scriptures were fulfilled.  The Messiah was born of the Virgin Mary.  He was called the “Son of God,” because He was.  He was named “Immanuel” meaning God with us. 

                Harold Lindsell, contemporary scholar, wrote in Christianity Today (12/77), “By the light of nature we see God above us.  By the light of the law we see God against us.  By the light of the gospel we see Jesus as Immanuel who is God with us.”

                Skeptics and apostates may question and deny, but they deny only their own reason, and assert their own faithlessness.  They do no injustice to the truth of God.

                We believe the prophecies of Christmas because they are true.  They are true because God intervened in history and brought them to pass.  The Babe of Bethlehem became Calvary’s Captive: The Lord of glory, at whose feet we fall, and to whom we pay homage.  Blessed Christmas season when once again we remind, and are reminded, that God has tabernacled among us and we have beheld His glory.

THE PREACHING OF JESUS

#008                                                            THE PREACHING OF JESUS                                                                                   

Scripture  Luke 6:39-49 NIV                                                                                                                      Orig. July 4, 1985

Passage:  ³⁹ He also told them this parable: “Can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit? ⁴⁰ The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like their teacher.  ⁴¹ “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? ⁴² How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.  ⁴³ “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. ⁴⁴ Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers. ⁴⁵ A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.  ⁴⁶ “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say? ⁴⁷ As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like. ⁴⁸ They are like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. ⁴⁹ But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.”

Purpose: Continuing a Wednesday night series from Luke emphasizing the preaching of Jesus

Keywords:          Luke, Christ, Preaching

Timeline/Series:               Luke

Introduction

                From the preaching of Jesus we have an example of preaching in the mold of Hebrew preaching in that day.  It not only helps us to understand the context of preaching in the way that He experienced it, but it also shows the variances that He added to for others to follow.

                Our text contains eleven verses.  There are at least six distinct ideas contained therein.  The themes are: Following those who don’t know where they are going; relationship of teacher and pupil; reality therapy; a tree and its fruit; good and evil persons; and building a house.

                Herein is the essence of Hebrew preaching.  The Jews had a word for it: charaz, meaning “stringing beads.”  The preacher, in order to maintain interest, was taught to hurry from topic to topic.  The Book of Proverbs is a fairly good example of such preaching.

                Here, we have an example of using this kind of contemporary communication.  But He was not limited to this.  We find Him broadening the base of preaching by using it to convey specific truth through teaching.  He controlled the manner of His preaching as surely as He did the message.

Rule #1—We can Share Effectively Only What We have Come to Grasp Sufficiently.  V39 “Can the blind lead the blind?  Will they not both fall into the ditch?”  The blind person is totally helpless with anything he has not experienced.  The blind person is helpless.  It is remarkable what some have achieved within their limitations.  There are golf tournaments for the blind.  A blind woman named Vera painted her house in New Orleans.  To try to take another where we have not been is a risk.  There are compensations for sighted persons, such as maps, aids. 

                There is room for consideration of both literal and metaphorical blindness. The Greek word tuphlos refers to either kind of blindness.  Its use here seems to suggest a literal blindness (physical).

                There are variances of blindness.  Some don’t see; some won’t see; some can’t see.  Helen Kellen spoke at Southern Seminary and said, “The worst thing is to have eyes and not be able to see.”  V40 “A disciple is not above his, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher.  Perfect/perfected—katertismenos in the Greek—suggests mending torn or broken nets.  In Matthew 4:21, “He saw James and John, . . . mending their nets.” Galatians 6:1 “Brethren, if a man is overtaken in a trespass (fault), you who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness.”

                There are compensations for blindness whether literal or otherwise. If literal, there is a cane, guide dog, surgery, miracle; if none of these work, there is always the arm of a friend. It is  so for metaphorical blindness, but the helper must first be able to see.

                The Golden Rules of Teaching

• A teacher is a hinge on which one’s future swings.
• We teach more by our walk than by our talk.
• Sometimes, an ounce of Christian living before a pupil is worth a ton of talk.
• It is not what the pupils remember that constitutes knowledge, but what they cannot forget.

Rule #2—Misshapen Attitudes Affect Us both as Teachers and Learners.  V41 “And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the plank in your own eye?”  There is another consideration of “don’t, won’t, can’t.”  What these two have in common:  Both have been rendered incapable of sight; both have seemingly correctible conditions.  Now, a look at the ways they differ: a speck v. a plank or sawdust v. a saw log; accident v. carelessness; knowledge v. ignorance; beyond control v. self-control.

                Dr. Criswell told about preaching in an Oklahoma revival.  Members came, but a wife and husband went to sleep. When the power suddenly failed, the husband woke up in the dark.  “Dr. Criswell,” he shouted, “Stop preaching and pray for me!  I’ve gone stark blind!”

                Don’t work to change others until you’ve made room for change in your own life.  A psychiatrist is an M.D. who goes through psychoanalysis himself.  As Edward Wallis Hoch wrote, “There is so much bad in the best of us, and so much good in the worst of us, that it hardly behooves any of us to talk about the rest of us.”

Rule #3—Good and Evil are Alike Products of Human Personality.  V 45 “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of the heart brings forth evil.”  Obedience to the highest good we know is the final test. Matthew 7:21, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of my Father in heaven.”  Psalm 1:2 “His delight is in the law of the Lord.” 

                The tree is known by what it produces.  I have two plums in my yard.  One is surrounded by little plums from last year’s fallen plums.  The other I race the birds to them. My tomato plants are not producing.  In the same way, the human heart produces what it is.  Does God see the maliciously evil differently from the ignorantly evil?  The evil done in the name of religion? The hostages! [1979-81]

Rule #4—What is in the Human Heart is Given Expression with What We Say.  V45 “Out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”  What does one say under pressure?  What does one habitually say? What do we say when no one hears?

Rule #5—They Are Happy Who do not Exchange Future Advantage for Present Pleasure.  V48 “He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock.”  The house builder is a useful illustration. He built his house during the dry season in the river bed.  When the rains came it was more difficult and more expensive. 

                We often have a choice between immediate convenience and long-term good.   Many people have trouble choosing what can’t be seen, such as the essence of spiritual decision.  Let us rebuke carelessness of spirit, as the University President whose goal was to raise a Christian family.  Let us require steadfastness; 1 Timothy 6:19, “Storing up for themselves a good foundation for the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life.”  Let us restore hope.  Storms do come.

***THE REMAINDER OF THIS SERMON HAS BEEN LOST***